The goal of the academic course of Theory and History of Restoration is to provide insight into the history of theories and practices of intervention on existing architecture.
Therefore, the course provides an overview of the evolution of architectural restoration and of its main trends, with particular attention to the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, up to the present time. In particular, we’ll examine the different attitudes of each epoch towards its past and their interaction with the development of history of architecture, technology, restoration. Finally, we’ll understand the contemporary scenario and the present objectives of of historical heritage preservation.
The course is preparatory to those of Restoration, to be followed during the fourth year. It also wants to promote the acquisition of a critical approach, in order to make the students understand and appreciate the past heritage and deal with the restoration design, developing their cultural awareness and technical skills.
Formal lectures. The students are asked to do an exercise assigned by the teacher.
1. The idea of Restoration
2. Restoration before Restoration
3. Neoclassicism and the second half of the eighteenth century
4. The modern idea of Restoration
5. The conservation attitudes and the English approach
6. Stylistic Restoration in Italy and its “objective version” of Historic Restoration
7. The Italian school. The “intermediate theory” and the philological approach
8. Middle-European approach to Conservation
9. WWII post-war and the Second half of the twentieth century
10. The different positions in the contemporary debate
Bibliography:
Anthology: